Modelling software filters out uncertainty

Licensing opportunity

Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Mathematics in Kaiserslautern, Germany, have developed 3D simulation software, called FilterDict, for modelling filters for a range of applications, avoiding the need to build prototypes.

The system could be applied, for example, to model filters for use in removing diesel particulates from car exhausts. It can show which filters are most efficient at extracting particles, and how the geometry of the filter materials affect its properties. This will avoid the need to build dozens of filters to test each parameter separately.

FilterDict has been tested by the automotive components manufacturer Bosch, which examined the properties of two diesel particulate filters, with and without a fiber matrix, and compared the results with those of the FilterDict simulations.

Now Bosch and the Fraunhofer researchers are extending their collaboration to simulate up to a hundred filters. Unsuitable types of filter can then be excluded from the outset – with researchers only building prototypes of filters that achieve satisfactory results in FilterDict. The software will be demonstrated at the Filtech trade fair in Wiesbaden from 27 February to 1 March.